Online video and social media marketing seem to be obvious choices for those tasked with marketing new video game titles, but I’m consistently surprised at how those strategies are misused, underused or used not at all.

Following are ways that video game marketing directors, brand managers and social media managers can help launch titles using video and social media marketing:

Recognizing its importance is not enough to make social strategy a reality. Social media marketing has gained its place at the table. eMarketer estimates 80% of companies with at least 100 employees will use social networks for marketing this year, up from nearly three in four last year. By 2012, usage will be even greater, and, in turn, efforts are becoming more sophisticated.

A recent survey of 700,000 consumers in the US shows that Facebook is the least popular social media site when it comes to consumer satisfaction according to the American Customer Satisfaction Index in its annual E-business report. Wikipedia ranks highest at 78 with YouTube next at 74 and Facebook at 66 on the acsi.org index. What is also revealing is that Google ranks the highest in the “Search engine and portal category” with a customer satisfaction index of 83.

Social media is many things to many people. For some, it’s a core part of their overall business and marketing strategy. For others, it’s a key player in driving traffic to their blog. For others, it’s a new toy they’re just beginning to play with. And for some, it’s about as interesting as pond moss. So, lots of uses and definitions, depending on who you speak to. Yet there is one area where all the definitions can come together and agree on, and that’s the area of social media myths. The claims from people that should know better, either for a hidden agenda or a lack of foresight. So, here are a few social media myths that we can probably all agree are out-of-date thinking at best, and dangerous advice at worst.

If you work in online marketing or social media, you know how difficult it can be to try and be everywhere at once. Social media monitoring tools can be extremely useful to help brands, companies and individuals keep up with all relevant social media activity.

Social Media Monitoring Tools not only helps you to check what people have to say about you or your company brand but they also help you analyze the ROI (return on investment), and the steps you need to take to improve your reputation and make your customers happy. In this article, I have compiled a large list of social media monitoring tools to help you reach your social media goals. Enjoy!

On Tuesday, June 28th, Google launched their latest foray in the social networking arena withGoogle+. In the days following the launch, as invites became more readily available, visits toGoogle+ steadily increased, particularly between July 5th and July 12th. To date, Tuesday, July 12th and Thursday, July 14th were the peak days for total visits.

In France, Viadeo and LinkedIn attracted 3 million and 2.7 million unique visitors respectively during June 2011, putting them head to head in the market. Both social networks engaged nearly equal user numbers, but analysing the demographics showed that users are from a variety of social grades. Executives (Cadre et Profession Intellectuelle Supérieure) were in the majority for both sites making up 37 percent of LinkedIn’s audience and 29.5 percent of Viadeo’s. The French network, Viadeo, attracted a larger share of the highest social grade (Artisan/commerçant/chef d’enterprise) as well as mid-management (Profession Intermédiaire, Cadre Moyen).